Hugh Jackman has stopped in Los Angeles on his way to visit family and friends in his native Australia. Jackman, 46, who lives most of the time in New York with his wife, actress Deborra-Lee “Deb” Furness, 59, and their two kids, Oscar, 15, Eva, 10, is in a good mood, happy to be going home for a few weeks. He is unpretentious in his black blazer, jeans and a white dress shirt open at the neck, topped off by a soft Australian accent and easy smile.

Jackman began his career as an actor on TV in his home country, then quickly found fame on the London stage in 1998, singing and dancing as Curly in the musical Oklahoma! Two years later he became an international movie star in X-Men by playing Logan/Wolverine, the signature role he has performed in six subsequent films. While best known for his movies Les Misérables, Van Helsing and the X-Men franchise, he also has a stellar TV and stage career, winning the Best Actor Tony for The Boy From Oz, one of his four hugely successful Broadway shows. He also created Laughing Man, which, like Newman’s Own (founded by Paul Newman in 1982), is a food company whose profits go to charitable work.

Now Jackman is about to hit movie screens again as the monstrously wicked pirate Blackbeard in Pan. The film, which opens Oct. 9, tells the tale of 12-year-old Peter, who’s swept up from a nasty London orphanage to Neverland, where embarks on a series of harrowing adventures that set him on his way toward becoming Peter Pan. Looming over it all is Jackman’s deliciously evil Blackbeard.

So Pan is special to you because, like Peter, your mother left you?

Yes. [But] I was more sensitive about its connection to my two adopted children. In scenes at the orphanage in the beginning of the movie, the nun talks harshly: “Your mums are not waiting for you. You’re not going to see them again.” I actually read this to my wife and talked to [director] Joe Wright about it. I went, “Hang on. This is dealing with adoption and orphans. I want to make sure that this movie is not something my kids are going to feel weird about.” Every movie I do, I think, My kids are going to see this. When it’s a movie about adoption, I want to make sure that they don’t feel uncomfortable. Peter Pan is a classic tale, but now we live in a different world where we’re more sensitive about adoption. I’m completely comfortable [with Pan]. If I wasn’t, I wouldn’t have done the film.

What were you like as a boy?

I was volatile. My mum left when I was 8. My anger didn’t really surface until I was 12 or 13. It was triggered because my parents were going to get reconciled and didn’t. All those years I’d been holding out hope that they would.

How angry were you?

There was this perfect storm of hormones and emotion. I’ve never said this before: I just remembered that we had those metal [school] lockers, and for some reason, half in fun, we used to head-butt the lockers until there was a dent in them. Like, who was the toughest and craziest? In playing rugby my rage would come out, rage that I identify as Wolverine rage. I’d be somewhere in a ruck in rugby, get punched in the face and I’d just go into a white rage.

Why?

From the moment Mum left, I was a fearful kid who felt powerless. I was the youngest. [Jackman has four older siblings.] I used to be the first one home and I was frightened to go inside. I couldn’t go into the house on my own. I’d wait outside, scared, frustrated. Growing up I was scared of the dark. I was scared of heights. It limited me. I hated it, and that contributed to my anger. Isn’t most anger fear-based, ultimately? It emanates from some kind of powerlessness. I was really feeling that.

You went to an all-boys’ school?

An amazing school! I was school captain, yeah! I did everything: sports, the school musical, the cadet corps. I couldn’t get enough. Maybe that’s because I was the youngest of five, watching my brothers and sisters being able to do stuff that I couldn’t do. I was like, “Wow, I’m a grown-up. Awesome!”

You were happy there?

It suited me down to the ground. Even now, as an actor, if you look at my choices, they’re very broad, from musical theater to this movie. I thrive more by not being stuck in one area. I look for discipline and the structure that I was given at school. Today, even when I’m not working, I structure my day. I’m regimented about my eating, my training, my singing practice and all that. I like that.

Next page: Find out when Hugh Jackman knew he was meant to be an actor

You studied journalism in college. Why did you give up on it?

For me, the goal was to become a stringer, travel the world and file reports. At the same time, I was also doing a lot of amateur theater. It was a hobby. I didn’t think that I could make a living acting. [But] I realized it’s not really who I am. I didn’t have the drive. I felt a bit of a fake. The [other] students were more passionate. When I went off to drama school for three years, that was it for me. I was acting like 10 to 12 hours a day. I was so happy!

When did you know that you were meant to be an actor?

I’m a Christian. I was brought up very religious. I used to go to different evangelists’ [revival] tents all the time. When I was about 13, I had a weird premonition that I was going to be onstage, like the preachers I saw.

Have you ever had moments as an actor that confirms you’re doing what you’re meant to be doing?

Absolutely. Many times. Onstage, in Boy From Oz, for example, the moment before the applause really exults you when you realize, with complete strangers, that you know each other, completely. It was a moment of honesty. I’d feel as intimate with an audience as with my wife. “This is who I am!” When it happens, it’s thrilling. Sometimes I feel more myself on a stage than I do off the stage.”

Why?

Onstage I feel an intimacy that feels natural, that’s transcendent. You’re beyond “Do people like me? How am I doing?” You get above that. I’ve very rarely experienced it in life, but onstage I experience it a lot. That’s what attracted me to it.

Setting aside the money and fame you earn, what does acting give you that you really need?

That’s the best question I’ve ever been asked. Peace. There are things driving me that aren’t all healthy—[needing] approval and respect to fill some hole who-knows-where in me. Am I worthy? All those fears. Through acting, I’m able to find a level of bliss and peace and calm and joy. And it feels natural.

Bliss, peace, transcendence: It sounds religious.

I’m a religious person. This is going to sound weird to you. In Chariots of Fire the runner Eric Liddell says, “When I run, I feel His pleasure.” And I feel that pleasure when I act and it’s going well, particularly onstage. I feel what everyone’s searching for, the feeling that unites us all. Call it “God.” Before I go onstage every night, I pause and dedicate the performance to God, in the sense of “Allow me to surrender.” When you allow yourself to surrender to the story, to the character, to the night, to the audience, transcendence happens. And when that happens, there is nothing like it on the planet. It’s the moment people experience when they fall in love, which is equally frightening and exciting. That’s what it feels like.”

Is that what you felt when you met your wife?

We met on a TV show [the Australian series Correlli]. I was terrified when I realized I had a crush on the star of the show. I was like, “My first job, the leading lady. Embarrassing. She’s going to look at me like this young little puppy.” I didn’t talk to her for a week. Finally, she said, “Have I done something to annoy you?” I said, “Look, I’ve got a crush on you. I’m sorry.” And she said, “Oh, I’ve got a crush on you too.” And that was 20 years ago [laughs].

Why is your marriage successful?

When I met Deb, I knew immediately I was going to marry her. I forced myself to wait six months because I thought, “Maybe it is infatuation. I’m too young to know.” It was ridiculous. Every day love just got deeper. I felt a complete trust with her to be exactly who I am. I don’t have to be any other version of Hugh Jackman for her to love me.

Nothing to prove?

Just be me. That is the greatest relief. Just letting go. I have these things that drive me, [but] I don’t ever feel them when I’m on the stage or with her.

Why did you adopt kids?

We always wanted kids. I was brought up in a family with five kids, two were adopted, three biological. It was a natural mix to me. Deb felt that way too. We thought we’d have a couple of biological children and maybe one adopted. But biologically, we couldn’t have kids, so that didn’t happen.

She had a couple of miscarriages?

Yes. It was a hard time. We went through IVF [in vitro fertilization]. Deb doesn’t give up. At a certain point I was like, “Deb, let’s adopt now.” In Australia at the time, you couldn’t do IVF and adopt simultaneously. So we adopted, and it has been the greatest, most fulfilling and challenging role of our lives.

What worries you the most?

My kids. They’re growing up with great privileges and great challenges. And they have this fame and paparazzi that I didn’t have to encounter because no one was interested in my father. We worry a lot. In some ways they get a free pass from people when they shouldn’t be given a free pass.

It produces entitlement?

Absolutely. I constantly talk to them about respect and gratitude. I say, “Unfortunately, I’m going to be tougher on you than I would be if I wasn’t famous, because people are actually going to be less tough on you in life.” In a way they have to be better behaved, be more respectful, have more gratitude than other kids. I try to keep their life as down-to-earth as possible. I really do.

You’re very involved in charities fighting AIDS, poverty and other causes. Where does your sense of obligation to help come from?

I was brought up with a religious sense of giving back. I am given opportunities, more money than I could ever need. If you see money or fame as energy, then use it to help others. Paul Newman did that. That’s what inspired me to start Laughing Man.Your wife is also involved?

Deb inspires me. She is constantly reminding me that we’re all connected. A person’s sick or hungry and needs help—well, help them! That’s all it is. Deal with what’s in front of you. Things have been put in front of me where I have to say, “OK, this is there for me to help.”